CONDUCTING SELLING TRANSACTIONS

Planning a Contact Discussion - Setting Targets

You are unlikely to make a significant sale to a new client in the course of a single contact. You will advance to a degree (you hope) with each contact; and by a series of advances achieve a sale. Advance is through a series of discussions - whether by mail, phone or meeting. In planning each contact discussion you need to have an idea of where you are starting from, and to set a realistic target of how far you might get in this discussion. It is also sensible to think about 1) stretch targets - how far you can go if things are going well and 2) fall-back targets - what is the minimum you expect to achieve from the discussion?

Figure 5.4 illustrates the process. At the left-hand side is shown the situation where client and consultancy have no knowledge of each other; at the right hand side is where they have agreed on a sale. The advantage of setting stretch and fall-back targets is that they encourage a more positive frame of mind. With a single target you either make it, or you don't. Under these circumstances it is tempting to set the target low and hence have a better chance of beating it. By contrast, a range of targets enables you to cope with the unexpected during a discussion, without a sense of 'failure'.

Figure 5.4: Setting targets for a discussion

There are two main areas in which you need to consider targets. Firstly, conversion and qualification. The buying process is the mirror of the sales process. Both aim to establish whether the client and consultancy firm should work together. The conversion and qualification process proceed hand in hand: when the buyer qualifies the consultant to the next stage of the buying process, then the consultant has converted the client to the next stage of the sales process, and vice versa. Secondly, information gathering. You need data to:

• specify the nature of the assignment to be undertaken;

• inform the conversion and qualification processes;

• understand the context of the sale - the key players, etc.

The detailed nature of the targets will change as the sale progresses, and they will have a significant influence over what is discussed: the agenda for the contact discussion. But the pursuit of an agenda willy-nilly will have a poor effect on the client relationships.

Although most important at the start of the sales process, relationships remain important throughout. Every contact has an impact on the relationship, and so you need to consider how to ensure that relationships continue to develop favourably throughout and avoid selling activities that may have a negative effect on them, for example, by pressurising the client to buy.

How to Approach a Prospect

Having identified a prospective client, you have to decide how you will approach them. Should you telephone and ask for an appointment, or do you need to warm him or her up with a letter beforehand? Figure 5.5 illustrates a simple model for developing business with a new client:

Figure 5.5: Developing business with a new client

Part of the promotional activity of larger consultancies is to circulate their own publicity literature, such as newsletters or business journals to prospective clients. This means that there will already be some awareness among prospects about the firm and its services. If this is the case, then there may be no need to warm up with a letter beforehand. Even so, promotional material might provide a convenient reason for writing to a client in the first place. For example, you may have recently published a newsletter highlighting a particular project you have carried out. Your letter might suggest (with good reasons!) why such a project might be of interest to the recipient.

Consultants' publicity material may have some sort of response mechanism built in (for example, a tear-off slip that can be returned to register interest or at least an e-mail address to send queries). This means that if approaches are focused on those who have shown interest, a better conversion ratio should result. Nowadays, you might consider an approach via e-mail. Unfortunately, there is so much junk e-mail that unless the recipient knows you there is a good chance that no attention will be paid to your message.

The objective in warming up the prospect is to provide enough information to convince him or her of the benefits of investing time in a telephone conversation, and become inclined towards the idea of meeting you. You are seeking, in fact, to satisfy the qualification process on the prospect's side. If your service can be explained and understood in a simple telephone conversation, this might be the best method of qualification. If it is complicated, or you feel uncomfortable at a direct approach, then writing a letter might be best. You must also consider what you are offering at the first meeting - what are the benefits to the prospect in meeting you. Some executives may be prepared to make time to see consultants speculatively, but rarely simply to hear them give a catalogue of their services. They need to know how the consultancy's services are going to develop business performance and competitiveness, or remedy problems. Sometimes consultants may offer an appraisal of (some aspect of) the business early in the relationship as an incentive. For example, a strategy consultancy might make a presentation on a business's position within its sector, hoping to display a knowledge and capability that will persuade the prospect to do business with them.

If the presentation is to be effective, then the consultancy has to invest time in preparing it. Time should not be invested lightly; the selling team should feel that it is spreading its seed on fertile ground. The presentation is therefore unlikely to be made at the first meeting between consultancy and prospect.

The Telephone Call

Although telephone technique is a basic selling skill, it is one in which I have found experienced consultants often to be weak. The following notes are therefore intended to summarize the key points.

One of the first challenges is getting through to speak to executives at a prospect. If they are warmed up and expecting you to call, then there is less difficulty. Even so it can be difficult to find a time when the executive is free to speak to you. As a salesperson you will want to keep the initiative and therefore will want to make the call yourself. If there is little incentive for a prospect to call back, it is unlikely he or she will do so. You have to make the call at times when you are free, so you need to know when the executive is likely to be free to receive it. It is best to avoid the core times for meetings: 10.00 am-12.00 pm and 2.00 pm-4.00 pm. Some consultants try to phone before 9.00 am or after 6.00 pm because they might also avoid a protective secretary at those times. Even so, my rule of thumb is that it often takes several telephone calls before you can get to speak to a prospect.

A further hint is to telephone after the hour or half-hour rather than before (that is, at 10.35 rather than 10.25). Meetings usually start on the hour or half-hour, so even if you get through at 10.25 am, the prospect may be about to go off to a meeting, and so have little time to speak. This is less likely to be the case at 10.35 am.

Secretaries (although an increasingly rare breed) are more often helpful than obstructive; ideally, you should make the prospect's secretary your ally in the selling process. Occasionally one might be too protective, asking your business and judging that it is unlikely to be of interest to the boss. If it really is impossible to get past the secretary, or enlist his or her help, you can try the following:

• Abandon this prospect. Invest your time in others that might offer a better chance of a sale. After all, an executive's secretary should be able to tell the difference between interesting and unwanted approaches.

• Try to bypass the secretary. You need to be convinced of the error of his or her judgement. Moreover, it could be embarrassing to end up talking to the secretary again despite trying to bypass him or her.

• Find a different point of access. This could be via another executive in the same organization, seeking an introduction through a mutual acquaintance, or aiming to 'bump into' the executive or an appropriate connector at some business or social function.

A secretary can be helpful in easing communication if the executive is proving inaccessible. A comment from the consultant might be: 'I wrote to Mr Smith last week concerning our services, which we thought might be of particular value to your business at this time. In my letter I said I'd phone to see whether we might meet, and to fix a mutually convenient time.' In my experience, the secretary's response might be: 'Yes, he's asked me to fix a meeting when you rang.' (Great!); 'He asked me to tell you that he's not interested.'; or 'He's not spoken to me about it.' In the last case you might then ask the secretary to find out what the boss wants to do, so that if he or she is not available next time you ring, at least you can stop wasting time if they are not interested. But this is very much a fall-back position if you can't get hold of the boss in the first place.

Nowadays, of course, there is a good chance that you don't actually talk to a human being, but engage with voice mail. Again, you should maintain the initiative - leave a message explaining why you are calling and say when you might call again. If you fail to make contact again, then suggest that the client calls you if they are interested. If they don't call, it means they are not interested and you can avoid wasting more time.

Preparing for the Telephone Call

Before placing the call, you have to have prepared the structure of the telephone conversation. Preparing what you are going to say is only half the telephone conversation. What are you aiming to find out, as well as to convey, in this conversation? You will want to confirm your understanding of the prospect's needs, the position of your contact in the buying process, and the next steps, at the very least. This is to enable you to qualify the prospect for the next stage.

You will also want to set some objectives for the discussion. There is a series of possible outcomes from a telephone approach:

1. receive an invitation to tender;

2. fix a meeting with the prospect;

3. meeting to be arranged at some future date;

4. send material then contact again;

5. call back at a specified time in future;

6. no interest.

It is unlikely that you get an invitation to tender because the prospect has an immediate need for your services. Even if you did, you would want to qualify this - you are unlikely to put in a proposal without first meeting the prospect.

Next best is that the prospect agrees to a meeting; you have achieved your objective in the telephone approach. The remaining outcomes are of decreasing commercial attractiveness. The reason for showing them, however, is that the outcome is not limited to a simple 'Yes/No' to a meeting. Even if there is no interest in your services now, you may have created a link that brings a prospective client into your network - a link you could probably nurture and exercise profitably at sometime in the future.

Conducting Sales Meetings

Having got access to your target prospect, the next step is to try to persuade the prospect to invite you to tender for a piece of consultancy work. This is accomplished by conducting one or a series of sales meetings.

Of these meetings, the most important is the initial contact made with each person involved in the buying process: 'You never get a second chance to make a first impression.' Better selling performance derives from stacking the odds more in your favour. The better the first impression, the better the chance of winning the sale. The first meeting, therefore, will have a profound effect on what follows, which is why this is the one on which we will concentrate. Obviously all the others will have some impact, but they will only modify that created at the first. Moreover, the first meeting will be significant as it will be largely instrumental in defining the general areas in which client and consultancy are to work together.

The relationship dimension is crucial. For example, the salesperson who catechizes a senior executive to identify the focus of a project may damage the relationship. Any meeting with a client will affect the relationship with the consultant, and so meetings must have a relationship objective as well as that of content. As indicated in Chapter 3, it may be better not to make a sale but win a worthwhile relationship, rather than the opposite.

Preparation for a Sales Meeting

Most consultants will nod vigorously when asked, 'Should you prepare for a sales meeting?' but will disagree on what form that preparation should take. If Wittreich's third criterion is to be satisfied (see above), the consultancy salesperson has to be more than simply a broker of useful resources; you have to show the value of the connection between the needs of the prospect's business and the services of the consultancy - for example, how your services will help the prospect address current key business issues. But again, as in the telephone conversation, you must avoid a preoccupation with what you are going to say. There is more extensive comment on the agenda for the first meeting below; for now, you should consider what you need to find out from the prospect, as well as what to say. The quality of questions and comments can serve to impress the prospect (or quite the opposite!).

Consequently you need to consider whether you need to take something along to the first meeting. One of my associates recommends that at the very least you take a printed sheet with a list of points for discussion - not necessarily as formal as an agenda - to the first meeting. The aim is to show that you have given some thought to this particular meeting; it is not a clone of a score of similar meetings you have conducted over the previous months.

Personal Impact

The salesperson in consultancy is initially the embodiment of the product. In selling a tangible item, it can be described and displayed. Not so in consultancy: the prospect will endow the consultancy service with the characteristics of the salesperson. Inevitably, the initial meeting will provide the client with a sample experience of working with you.

Consultants learn early in their careers how to dress properly, how to relate to clients and how to manage their body language. These requirements are as relevant to selling as they are to consultancy. It is important to recognize that people take in information through what they see, hear and feel, and use all three channels. People have preferences, so each salesperson will have his or her own preference. The danger is that you will then use that channel exclusively; this will be all right with clients who have the same preference, but less effective with those whose preference is different. So, you need to consider visual aids, the words you use, and the rapport you generate with the prospect.

Opening the Sales Meeting

For those new to selling, there is a problem about what to say after the initial pleasantries. Figure 5.6 suggests an outline agenda for an initial meeting.

1. Pleasantries

2. Bridge to the business discussion

3. Probing for prospects' concerns

4. Discussing how these concerns might be jointly addressed

5. Decide next steps

Figure 5.6: Outline agenda for an initial meeting

As with meeting anybody for the first time, a meeting will open with pleasantries, to start building a personal relationship. Get the prospect talking early on; because you have an agenda doesn't mean you have to do all the talking!

There then needs to be a natural bridge to talking about business. This needs to be done by body language as well as orally. Opening your briefcase and bringing out your pad and pen will serve to show that the business of the meeting is going to start.

Some years ago, I had reached this point in my first meeting with a finance director of a prospective client, to whom I had been introduced by the personnel manager, who reported to him. I had some previous discussions with the personnel manager who, I assumed, had briefed the FD. We then commenced the meeting and I proceeded on from the discussions I had with the personnel manager. After about 15 minutes, the FD stopped and said, 'Hang on a minute; what are we talking about here? I'm lost.' The personnel manager had not briefed him, and that was the last meeting I had with that prospect. With that experience behind me, I favour a recap on the background to the meeting as an introduction to the business discussion. This serves to make sure that both you and the prospect are starting from the same point.

A technique that salespeople are sometimes taught is to take 'control' of a meeting. What this means in practice is controlling the agenda. Personally as a prospect, I'm not sure I want to be controlled. The prospect will be coming to the sales meeting with an agenda, even if it is not articulated. The good salesperson will allow for the fact that the prospect has an agenda and will let him or her express it. So, you will perhaps wish to agree on what you are going to cover. If it is a first meeting, it is helpful for you and your prospect each to give a brief summary of your business and where you fit into it.

These first items on the agenda are relatively uncontentious and will serve to help build rapport. Next you have to start to probe for the prospect's concerns and show how your services relate to them. (The probing pyramid technique, set out below, can be used for structuring this part of the meeting.) Finally, as shown in Figure 5.6, you have to agree on the next steps to be taken by both sides following the meeting, which ideally should take the selling process on to the next stage.

The Probing Pyramid: How to Establish the Prospect's Needs

It can be difficult, however, to decide what questions to ask. What do you need to know? What kind of questioning should you use? I am indebted to my colleague, Dennis Sobey, for introducing me to the concept of the 'probing pyramid', which helps to identify the prospect's needs. Although a simple model, it can provide the basis for an extensive discussion. Once the probing pyramid is understood and put into action, it provides you with both the types of question to ask and the order in which they might be asked, as the meeting - or a series of meetings - progresses. It is particularly useful in planning the first meeting with a new prospect.

The framework is shown in Figure 5.7. The sequence of the agenda is shown on the right. At the start you may discuss facts about the business, but then you need to move on to the issues affecting the business. There are two potential traps at this stage. Firstly, it is tempting, having identified one issue, then to proceed with the next stages. At an initial meeting, if you are to identify other relevant issues, note each issue, and then remain at item 2 in the agenda until you have exhausted this topic, or make sure that you return to it. Secondly, it is tempting to leap straight from item 2 to item 5 without going through items 3 and 4. Items 3 and 4 enable you to focus your response in item 5 in a way that will be attractive to the prospect.

Figure 5.7: The probing pyramid